The present invention relates in general to telecommunications signal processing and more particularly to a system and method of detecting overload in a service control point of a telecommunications network.
In a telecommunications network, a service control point may interact with multiple network service switching points. In this scenario, it is likely that there will be periods when the service control point receives more transaction messages from its associated service switching points than it can process. Also, the service management system or operation support systems may present the service control point with service version update commands at a time when all of its resources are applied to servicing transaction messages from service switching points. In this overload condition, input queues back up and can eventually lead to queue overflow that will result in message loss or system failure. Therefore, it is desirable to provide a capability to detect such an overload condition and take actions to alleviate the situation.
From the foregoing, it may be appreciated that a need has arisen for a technique to detect overload within a service control point of a telecommunications network. In accordance with the present invention, a system and method of detecting overload in a service control point of a telecommunications network are provided that substantially eliminate or reduce disadvantages and problems associated with conventional service control point operation.
According to an embodiment of the present invention, there is provided a method of detecting overload in a service control point of a telecommunications network that includes sending a latency request to a service logic interpreter in an intelligent processing unit of a service control point. In response to the latency request, the service logic interpreter provides a latency response from which a latency for the service logic interpreter is determined and stored in a memory. A queue depth for a queue in the service logic interpreter is also stored in the memory. In response to the latency and the queue depth stored in the memory, an overload rating is determined for the intelligent processing unit of the service control point.
The present invention provides various technical advantages over conventional service control point operation. For example, one technical advantage is to determine an overload rating of an intelligent processing unit within a service control point. Another technical advantage is to discard or reroute incoming service messages in response to an overload rating of the service control point. Yet another technical advantage is to determine a system wide overload rating for a service control point having multiple intelligent processing units. Still another technical advantage is to minimize processing time by analyzing overload condition of a service control point only when there is a change in the overload rating. Other technical advantages may be readily ascertainable by those skilled in the art from the following figures, description, and claims.